obsessively sharing my every thought

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince – J.K. Rowling

I finished up HP and the Half-Blood Prince last Friday and AM JUST NOW ABLE TO WRITE ABOUT IT BECAUSE EMOTIONS!!!

In this book, we continue our journey with HP and his schooling. He is now in his 6th year at Hogwarts. We start in this book with two very important scenes. First, we see Narcissa (Draco Malfoy’s mom, whose family is known death eaters), requesting assistance from Severus Snape (who is a known “reformed” death eater and part of the Order of the Phoenix). She has him make the “unbreakable vow” to assist Draco with orders he receives from the Dark Lord. The second scene we watch Dumbledore pick up Harry from the Dursley’s to take him to the Burrow. On the way, they stop to visit what seems like an abandoned home. There, they meet Horace Slughorn, a former teacher at Hogwarts. Dumbledore’s goal was to persuade Slughorn to return to Hogwarts to “collect” HP into his sort of “repertoire” of famous wizard friends, in which Dumbledore is successful. After which he is deposited back at the Burrow with the Weasleys plus Hermione.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione (along with Ginny, of course), return to Hogwarts for their 6th year. Snape finally is allowed to take over DAtDA class, because Slughorn will resume his post as potions teacher. With this change, Harry, as well as Ron, continues studies with DAtDA. Using a book he borrows from Slughorn, Harry takes top spot in the class due to suggestions and spells written by the previous owner, The Half-Blood Prince. This allows Slughorn to like him *that much more*.

Some various other things happen during the year, but the most important thing is that Dumbledore begins giving Harry private “lessons” where Dumbledore shares with Harry memories that he has collected from people. All the memories grant them access to clues as to what Voldemort is planning. During these lessons, Dumbledore says that he has specifically asked Slughorn back due to a particular memory that he wishes to have access to. Dumbledore requires Harry to be able to “collect” this from Slughorn (in which Harry is successful). From that memory we discover that Voldemort was inquiring about Horcruxes, a branch of dark magic that allows the wizard to split and implant his soul into an object at the cost of murdering a person. Through the memory we also find out that Voldemort wanted to make 7 total horcruxes! Dumbledore reveals that two have already been destroyed (the ring of Tom Riddle’s Grandfather, and the diary from The Chamber of Secrets). During the book, Harry accompanies Dumbledore to recover one more from a hidden cave, leaving the total number of unknown horcruxes at 4 by the end of the book.

So, as you can tell just form my “summary”, this HP is CHALK-FULL of stuff! Again, Rowling is AMAZE-BALLS and puts so much into these books. If you have read the book, or you have seen the movie, you know I’m leaving out a HUGE part… but honestly, I don’t want to spoil it for others. Even in the worst of parts, this book was truly moving. I had no complaints about this one… in fact, it may have became my favorite book so far!

I’m soon to start HP and the Deathly Hallows and I almost don’t even want to because I don’t want the story to end! That’s when you know its a great series!!!